Davidson: plans for camp still "up in the air"

John Davidson is as fired up as anyone to get the season started, but he preached patience this morning when discussing plans for the upcoming training camp.

While the NHL's new collective bargaining agreement awaits ratification from both the Board of Governors and the Players Association (expected to be completed by the end of the week), Davidson and the Blue Jackets hockey operations staff have jumped into full-fledged planning mode for what is likely to be a short training camp.

Depending upon the official start of camps -- NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly told Chris Johnston of the Canadian Press that the plan is currently for a Sunday start -- teams will have between five days and a week to get into motion for a 48-game regular season.

And though no plans have been finalized by the Blue Jackets, Davidson said the process for making those decisions is well under way.

"We're going to have some meetings (Tuesday) on all that stuff," Davidson said. "Some teams, I'm sure, are going to bring in 30 players and some are going to want their roster at 23 and that's it. That's all going to be discussed."

One thing the Blue Jackets want to be cognizant of while formulating plans for camp is the situation in Springfield with their American Hockey League affiliate. The Falcons are having a strong start to their season and have run into injury trouble of late, so Davidson said the team must keep all of those factors in mind when deciding who gets the call-up to Columbus for training camp.

"You have to understand: Springfield's playing," Davidson said. "We have to be respectful to them and be respectful to our group to get ourselves ready. It's a short camp and there are no exhibition games, so you have to just try to do what makes sense for everybody.

"We'll get it figured out today when we go and have those meetings."

Davidson was non-committal when asked which type of camp format (small or large group) would be most beneficial to the Blue Jackets. What's most important, he said, is coming up with a plan and structure that works for everyone.

"We're going to discuss all that stuff (in the near future)," Davidson said. "It's really up in the air right now. The coaches have had some ideas for quite some time, but that always changes with the length of the lockout.

"Now we know it's going to be a short camp whenever they get the puck dropped, so we have to do what's right."